Cape doctor photographs marvels of the Antarctic

Ellen Chahey

Friday

Jan 22, 2010 at 2:00 AM

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 When Kelly Swanson, an oncologist at Cape Cod Hospital, wanted to indicate the wingspan of an Antarctic albatross, she and a visitor spread their arms and looked around her office in the cancer center.

NO NEED TO LAND – An albatross can glide for months if it can catch fish. Behind its beak is a gland that turns salt water into fresh.

When Kelly Swanson, an oncologist at Cape Cod Hospital, wanted to indicate the wingspan of an Antarctic albatross, she and a visitor spread their arms and looked around her office in the cancer center.

“Yeah, wider than this office,” she confirmed. “Their wingspan is 10 to 12 feet, and they can soar for months.” The birds dip into the water for fish but don’t need to land; air currents keep them circling the icy water and floes that support the penguins below.

“Months?”

“”Yes,” Swanson agreed. “Months.”

Such a bird sounds invincible, but it isn’t. “The albatross is really in trouble,” said Swanson. In fact, she added, “they’re the worst off of all species in Antarctica. About a hundred thousand albatross are lost every year.”

Long-line fishing is one problem, according to Swanson, because the technique strings miles of baited filament in the air. Albatross, eager for food, take the bait and its hook, and then drown as the line sinks into the water.

Swanson made her second trip to Antarctica in November. The trek gained some notoriety when some British Broadcasting Corporation personnel on board reported to the world that their cruise had become icebound. “It was pretty dull, actually,” said Swanson, who said that she and the other passengers were “never in any danger” and that she preferred to talk about the albatross.

Part of the threat to the birds’ survival as a species, said the physician, is their mating habits. They mate for life and produce only one or two offspring every other year, she said. Swanson said that unspecified “rodents” introduced into the birds’ nesting areas prey on their eggs and further endanger the species.

The New York Times Guide to Essential Knowledge says that Antarctica “has no indigenous population.” But human beings from around the planet are trying to help the albatross.

On the fishing lines, for example, flags hang “like scarecrows,” Swanson said. Everyone wins from this arrangement, she added. The birds don’t drown, and the lines catch more fish.

Also, said Swanson, dogs are now prohibited from the frozen land, and human visitors must submit to thorough vacuuming and cleaning of clothes and boots. “You can’t bring anything there that you can’t bring back,” she said in summary.

In this time of New England snow and cold, it is hard to imagine one of the dangers to humans that Swanson witnessed. You can get “quite a sunburn” there, she said. A second-degree sunburn, the kind that raises a blister, is one possibility. She said that she even knew of people who got sunburns in their mouths. She added that penguins have started to take afternoon naps, because the air is too hot for them.

The sunburns and the naps have to do with the hole in the ozone layer, said Swanson. She said that a Web site tracks its location every day.

Swanson described herself as “as a lousy birder,” but has enjoyed watching the albatross and the penguin on her two trips to Antarctica. “The average person doesn’t know there are birds on the planet that are this big,” she said of the albatross.

She recommended the Web site www.savethealbatross.net for information about the bird with the wingspan that’s bigger than her office. And she said that the cartoon movie Happy Feet depicts penguins well.

Maybe Antarctica itself is of the most interest, according to this person who has gone there twice, “once to each side, east and west.”

According to Swanson, the continent is “shared by everyone; any country can conduct science there.”

She referred to a 1959 treaty which the New York Times Guide to Essential Knowledge says “prohibited military operations, nuclear explosions, and the disposal of radioactive waste” on the continent.” A 1991 addition, according to the Times reference, “barred for 50 years the exploration of Antarctica for oil or minerals, and contained additional provisions covering wildlife protection, waste disposal, and marine pollution.”

Surrounded by the photographs she has taken of Antarctic birds, Swanson reflected on her memories of that icebound land, and said, “ it’s the only place on the planet where there’s peace.”

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